


the greatest thing you'll ever learn

by amaelamin



Category: VIXX
Genre: Alternate Universe - Moulin Rouge! Fusion, Falling In Love, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-01
Updated: 2016-08-01
Packaged: 2018-07-28 15:54:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7647313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amaelamin/pseuds/amaelamin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>birthday fic. you will have to know the movie for this to truly make sense. it contains a lot of the show's dialogue and lyrics - almost a songfic in parts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the greatest thing you'll ever learn

**Author's Note:**

> originally posted on AFF on 19 jul 2016.

_This story is about… love._

The glamour that surrounds the Moulin Rouge, its glitter and awe and thrilling debauchery – it is all empty and hollow. It is cheap sequins sewn onto French lace and poor makeup on achingly beautiful faces, crystal that may as well be glass, men who profess undying love and devotion _forever_ when they only mean _tonight_ , proud heartbroken whores and a dull cynicism soothed only by the rustle of cash. Lots and lots of cash.

The four bohemian ideals? Don’t joke. Don’t you actually mean the _illusion_ of freedom, _dangerous_ beauty, _selective_ truth, and love _for sale_?

*

 _“A_ writer _?” Hakyeon draws back in alarmed surprise, lips only a breath apart from the impostor duke’s._

 _“Well, yes,” the man falters, confused. “I thought you knew-”_ Damn it _. Hakyeon had been thanking his lucky stars that the trick this time had turned out to be young, rather fetching and sweetly awkward, but trust things to end up that he was trying to seduce a random writer whom god only knew how had managed to get inside his boudoir. He barely holds himself back from rolling his eyes in frustration._

_“You’re not a duke?”_

_“Duke?” The writer’s eyes go wide. “I’m not a duke.”_

_Hakyeon sighs and pushes the poor idiot off of him. “Then you’re out of luck.”_

_“Luck?”_

_“Kindly drop the parrot act,” Hakyeon tells him, not unkindly. “Don’t take this personally, but you were supposed to be someone else.”_

_“I don’t understand-”_

_Hakyeon pushes him towards the door, already wondering where the actual duke whom he’s supposed to be tantalising, fascinating and captivating is, when the writer digs in his heels and turns around, refusing to budge._

_“You said you loved me,” he says, eyes painfully innocent._

Hakyeon sighs again.

The outside of his elephant boudoir is much the same as the inside – ostentatiously decorated and ostentatiously comfortable, full of intense dark colours of wine and sapphire and bronze though he insists on ivory silk sheets – nothing better than white to show off the gold and honey of his skin when he’s lying undressed on them. Nothing better than tiny diamonds woven into his hair to highlight the ebony richness of it, nothing better than the best French cologne and masterfully tailored clothes to present a dream, a fantasy of himself – perfect and always beyond your reach unless your pockets are as deep as your darkest sins.

It’s cold tonight under the elephant’s little roof pavilion, and all he’s wearing is a simple red robe tied loosely at the waist but he welcomes the chill and the solitude. It’s the furthest thing from the crowded, sweaty dancehall and the closeness of his cluttered chamber. The air smells pure because of the cold, and Hakyeon snorts in soft amusement to himself at the thought that it’s the only pure thing around here.

It had been a shock, to be sure, when the stuttering, nervous writer had opened his mouth and started singing, promises of romance and happy endings rolling enticingly off his tongue. It was an amusing daydream for a moment.

_How wonderful life is, now you’re in the world._

The new writer will do well. He has a way with words.

Hakyeon is almost at the bottom of the stairs and just about to go back into his boudoir when he hears scuffling coming from above him, like someone is struggling to climb up the side of the elephant. Hakyeon rolls his eyes. Honestly, these ridiculous men –

He contemplates whether to entertain the lovestruck – lust-struck, more likely – fool or to send Chocolat to drive him away, and curiosity gets the better of him. Nobody’s ever tried to actually climb up the elephant before; though what the potential suitor thinks he’s going to offer Hakyeon in hopes that his arduous journey will be suitably repaid, Hakyeon is sure he doesn’t know. Hakyeon ascends the stairs once more, anticipating just how shocked the man is going to be when he finds Hakyeon waiting disdainfully for him.

It’s the writer, looking like a deer caught in the headlights. Hakyeon is both surprised and unsurprised – these idealistic ones tend to be hard to dissuade.

The writer – Taekwoon, Hakyeon reminds himself; it doesn’t do to be impolite – gets to his feet and looks like he’s ready to climb right back down the rope again once he glances at Hakyeon and the expanse of chest the silk robe isn’t covering.

“Well?” Hakyeon says, only slightly teasing.

“I’m sorry,” Taekwoon blurts out, and Hakyeon wants to smile at the timbre of his voice. He sounds like a gentle person, whomever this Jung Taekwoon really is, and should really go back to his mother before the Moulin Rouge ruins him. “But I saw you from my room – I’m in the Hotel Blanche, just there – I mean, I wasn’t watching you, but-”

Hakyeon watches him grow steadily more flustered until Taekwoon just stops talking in his embarrassment. “I just wanted to thank you. For getting me the job,” he finally says so softly Hakyeon almost doesn’t catch it.

“You’re very welcome,” Hakyeon answers warmly, charmed with this bumbling innocent despite himself. He doesn’t like that he’s so charmed, so now that he’s been thanked he bids Taekwoon goodnight, and turns to leave.

“I-” Taekwoon calls out quickly behind Hakyeon, and if it’s possible he sounds even more nervous now than he did before. “I – forgive me, I need to know.”

Hakyeon turns around, and waits.

“Before, when you thought I was the duke… you said you loved me. Were you just pretending?”

“Of course,” Hakyeon replies coolly. Taekwoon blatantly fails to mask the disappointment on his face.

“Of course,” he agrees, to his credit recovering quickly and trying to smile. “Silly of me to think someone like you could fall in love with someone like me. You’re so high above me, among the stars. All I have to do is look at you and the words begin to flow.”

“ _My gift is my song and this one’s for you?_ ” Hakyeon smiles, and if it’s an actual genuine smile, Taekwoon doesn’t have to know. “Don’t take it personally. I can’t fall in love with anyone.”

Taekwoon goggles at him in speechlessness for a moment, and Hakyeon very nearly laughs in his face at his expression. “Oh, please, you artistic types with your heads in the clouds. Love means living life from one dream to the next and dreading the day the dreaming ends.”

“You can’t tell me you really believe all that about diamonds and – a – a material world, and-”

“And why not?” Hakyeon counters, eyes flashing. “Diamonds put food on the table. Love does – what? Give me a maharajah over a penniless sitar player any day. I refuse to starve in the gutter.”

Taekwoon opens his mouth and closes it a few times in incredulity, letting the insult go. “Hakyeon, _love_ – love is like oxygen. Love is a many splendoured thing, love lifts us up to where we belong! All you _need_ is love.”

Hakyeon stares at him in disbelief, aware his jaw has dropped unattractively but uncaring in the face of this abrupt sentimental waterfall of nonsense. “And you’re in love with me like this, are you? This great be all and end all? This fantastic emotion that is apparently stronger than hunger and cold?”

“Hakyeon-” Taekwoon drops his gaze, sudden burst of words drying up.

“You speak of things you don’t even know,” Hakyeon shakes his head briskly at him. “Let me tell you how the world really works. What you call love – it lasts only as long as people are beautiful and young, and we all lose our charms in the end. Every single last one of us will become old and unlovely and unloveable, and ultimately, unloved. There is no forever.”

Hakyeon stops, and the devastated look on Taekwoon’s face stabs him with guilt that he tries to ignore. Hakyeon’s doing him a favour, disabusing him of fancy airy notions that have no place in the real world among people not born into wealth or aristocracy. He must have a talk with Toulouse later about ensnaring poor gullible souls with his ridiculous spiel on bohemian ideals and immortality – 

“It’s all just lust, Taekwoon. Don’t blame yourself. Once you’ve stuck your dick in a few people you’ll feel differently about me-”

“I would love you forever,” Taekwoon cuts into Hakyeon’s diatribe softly, and Hakyeon’s mouth snaps shut. “I look at you and I burn. You’re beautiful in a way that hurts, that soothes. You make me want to be a hero for you, to make us heroes together. You make me want to steal time just to be in your presence for longer than what’s allowed to me. You’re so beautiful now. You’ll be beautiful to me forever, young or old. I want to talk to you, I want to spend time with you. I want you to tell me things and I want to – I want to see what you like to eat, and read, and do, and-”

Hakyeon stares, and wants so badly to laugh at this barrage of more words than he’s heard Taekwoon say at one go from the moment they met, but the sound sticks traitorously in his dry throat. There is a stronger breeze whipping up around them now, colder than ever, and Hakyeon shivers; but he’s unexpectedly shaken more by the sincerity in Taekwoon’s voice than the tendrils of cold finding their way into his robe. Look at this – this broke, hapless writer newly arrived in Paris with a spring in his step and twinkle in his eye like a newborn baby unaware of the prowling wolves, passionately declaring his love like it is nothing – Hakyeon looks away the moment Taekwoon takes a half-conscious step forward towards him, and Taekwoon stops himself. Hakyeon hugs his arms around his own body to shore up his defences.

“Lies. You – you would be mean,” Hakyeon mutters, trying to still the anger he feels at himself. So weak. “All the men are, in the end.”

“No, I won’t,” Taekwoon protests, reaching for him, hands surprisingly warm on Hakyeon’s arms.

“I drink a lot,” Hakyeon warns, trying not to be distracted by the warmth of Taekwoon’s hands. “And you’re seducing me with words. It isn’t fair.”

“But it’s working?” Taekwoon asks hopefully.

Hakyeon stares at him. “I don’t believe in love, Taekwoon. Some people want to fill the world with silly love songs. You’d think that we’d all have wised up and had enough by now.”

Taekwoon lets his hands drop to Hakyeon’s, daring to take them in his and hold them, Hakyeon looking down at their enjoined fingers and going quiet, chest full. Many men have offered jewels, beautiful clothes, trips to faraway places, anything just to possess Hakyeon’s body; Taekwoon has nothing to his name, and instead is offering his heart.  

“Well, what’s wrong with love songs?” Taekwoon asks gently. “What’s wrong with me?”

“Nothing would keep us together,” Hakyeon whispers, breath catching in his throat.

“Just for one day,” Taekwoon whispers back, and smiles when Hakyeon looks up at him with the last of his skepticism. “We could be heroes, Hakyeon. Forever and ever.”

He kisses Hakyeon softly, worshipfully, and as Hakyeon closes his eyes the sky opens up.

**

“ _How wonderful life is, now you’re in the world,”_ Taekwoon hums, scribbling fiercely into his script notebook; pausing ever so often to stare out into space or turn to look at Hakyeon lying wonderfully, gorgeously dishevelled in his bed.

Hakyeon hadn’t even realised that he was putting on a show when he’d taken Taekwoon to bed for the first time – trying to figure out quickly what Taekwoon’s type was so he could perform appropriately; wilting flower, bright and bubbly, or smouldering and tempting – until Taekwoon had frowned slightly, awkwardly, cheeks flushed and fingers tentative on Hakyeon’s cheek.

“What is it?” Hakyeon had asked. “Don’t worry, just lie back, I’ll take care of you-”

“No, I don’t want you to,” Taekwoon frowned harder, struggling to find the words as Hakyeon pulled back in consternation.

“You don’t want me to do what?” Hakyeon asked, stung.

“Don’t… act. You don’t have to. Not for me.”

Hakyeon froze, mortified, eyes large. Taekwoon kissed him, softly, coaxing, moving so they could both lie on their sides in his bed and still touch, his hands not going anywhere below Hakyeon’s waist until Hakyeon got the message. He kissed Hakyeon until Hakyeon took over, rolling Taekwoon onto his back and pouring quiet moans and whimpers into Taekwoon’s mouth that felt real, more real than the arched back and strident moans and overwrought arousal of earlier – when Hakyeon slid home inside him with a heartrending sigh and a choked sob Taekwoon had pressed their foreheads together and told him over and over how much he loved him.

“Tell me what you want,” Taekwoon had whispered. “I’m yours. Tell me what you want me to do for you.”

Hakyeon thinks about that now as he looks at Taekwoon – about being asked and not told, about being given and not taken.

He watches Taekwoon write, first in his notebook and then abruptly leaving the bed to hunch over naked in front of his typewriter and type furiously; Hakyeon tries not to smile. He drops into bouts of total unselfconsciousness while simultaneously being so shy that he’s an enigma to Hakyeon, but Hakyeon feels a kinship with this duality that he has never had to think about before. Experimentally he sprawls over the bed unglamourously; hard angles instead of soft curves, comfort over aesthetic – Taekwoon looks back at him and starts rattling off a sentence, asking Hakyeon which words would fit better. He begins to smile, suddenly, and Hakyeon immediately collects all his limbs and re-arranges himself in embarrassment, but Taekwoon isn’t looking at his body.

“The way the light from the window hits your hair this way,” he’s still smiling, “I never realised how it’s actually a deep brown. Pretty.”

He turns back to snag his notebook and starts writing away again, Hakyeon finding himself at a loss for words. Maybe he should try farting in front of Taekwoon next, as unthinkable as it seems. He’s always had to be poised, perfect, slender limbs and curves in the right places, honey skin taken care of wonderfully – satin smooth, with exceedingly fine gold dust rubbed into it so that he literally shines – plump lips, soft hair, straight back, head high. But Taekwoon – Hakyeon is rapidly finding, to his alarm and disbelief, that Taekwoon sees all of that anyway, no matter what Hakyeon could be doing – slumped over covered in mud snoring with his mouth wide open and drool dripping down his cheek. It’s ridiculous.

“I’ve got it now. For this scene they will light you in soft yellow light,” Taekwoon tells Hakyeon over his shoulder. “You will look like you’re glowing on the stage. The most beautiful thing the audience has ever seen. A star.”

Hakyeon stares at the back of Taekwoon’s head, and ignores his heart when it starts to swell.

“I’m sleeping with the writer, not the lighting director,” he jokes to cover his overspill of emotion, and Taekwoon turns around to scowl at him, oblivious.

Hakyeon tells him things he’s never told anyone. He’s horrified at himself at first for the words that spill out of his mouth, and he dreads the look on Taekwoon’s face when he tells Taekwoon about his first night at the Moulin Rouge and his first customer, but Taekwoon peppers small kisses over his face as he speaks and then once more, longer, when Hakyeon’s done.

“You’re beautiful to me,” he says simply. “No matter what.”

So Hakyeon tries to shock him – telling him the things he’s done, the things he’s been paid well to have done to him, and he imagines he can see the calm mask of Taekwoon’s face flicker once or twice.  And yet:

“I love you. It doesn’t matter.”

And Hakyeon slowly begins to see that for Taekwoon, being with Hakyeon is its own freedom too – painfully shy at times, so softspoken – to be perfectly honest, _non_ -spoken as well – in front of the crew and the other cast, all the other dancers and diamond dogs, in front of Harold and most of all, in front of the Duke; he’s the silent genius, the taciturn writer. He sits in the wings during rehearsals, watching the actors and Hakyeon and the dancers (and Hakyeon), overseeing the costumes and the music and the way the lines are delivered but saves most of his words for when they are alone together. Taekwoon talks, and talks, and Hakyeon listens and loves.

“Are you hungry?” Taekwoon comes back to bed and stretches out next to Hakyeon, looking down at him with that expression on his face that Hakyeon cannot look at for long because it fills him with a desperate feeling of not being good enough.

“Not for food,” Hakyeon grins, and Taekwoon ducks his head laughing. It’s still so easy to fluster him.

The first time Hakyeon truly lets himself go with Taekwoon he feels every slide of Taekwoon’s hands over his skin and the feel of Taekwoon’s mouth and tongue and lips as if each sensation is glowing in technicolour after only knowing life in black and white. He doesn’t let himself think, or plan, or pose; he focuses on Taekwoon’s face and Taekwoon touching him and Taekwoon moving inside him. He looks down at Taekwoon lying on his back underneath him, fingers digging into his hips and head thrown back; Taekwoon likes Hakyeon to be in charge, on top in any way – and for the first time Hakyeon feels truly powerful in a way he never has before.

It is the kind of realisation that shakes him to his very core, knowing the trust Taekwoon has in him and the value of his life in Hakyeon’s hands – Taekwoon is his, his in every way he can be, just as Taekwoon loves him in every way. He doesn’t care about making his release sexy or enticing – he rides out his orgasm to the end, making sure he enjoys it fully, and he knows Taekwoon losing it underneath him is absolutely a result of seeing him let go like this.

“I love you,” Taekwoon presses kisses into his hair later, the sun set now and twilight washing through the wide open windows.

“You just love me because I’m beautiful,” Hakyeon says, and for the first time, he’s only teasing.

“You’re beautiful _and_ I love you,” Taekwoon replies. “The world sparkles because you’re in it.”

“Don’t you ever get embarrassed saying those things?”

“Not to you,” Taekwoon says in his soft voice.

_How wonderful life is, now you’re in the world._

**

“Are you mad?”

Harold takes a step towards Hakyeon, who takes an equal step backwards. His heart is pounding so hard Hakyeon can hear nothing else – his hands are icy and he clenches them to stop them shaking. Not in front of Harold. “The Duke holds the deeds to the Moulin Rouge and you are dallying with the _writer_?”

Hakyeon forces himself to take a breath and smile, scornful look already in place, but Harold sees right through him like he is made of glass, and just as likely to break.

“I saw you together!”

Hakyeon turns away then, unable to continue looking at Harold. One shuddering breath, and then another, and another. _I can fix this. I can fix this._

“It’s just an infatuation,” he throws over his shoulder, trying to come across as unconcerned. “It’s nothing. Really, Harold, I’m surprised at you.”

“Good. Then the infatuation will end. Go to the boy and tell him it’s over. The Duke will be waiting in the Gothic Tower at eight.”

Hakyeon waits until Harold’s footsteps die away before he lets himself take another breath, gasping for it this time like the air that fills his lungs cannot properly sustain him or the desperate pain blooming inside his chest. There is nothing he wants from the Duke – not his money or his favours or patronage, his jewels or time or admiration – he doesn’t want to be a star anymore. He doesn’t need the stage or the applause or the critical acclaim, _none of it_ – he wants to never have heard of the Duke. It’s no longer a simple deception or a careless lie.

Taekwoon has ruined him – ruined him in every way that matters now if they are to save the Moulin Rouge and all its people, because he cannot imagine someone else touching him. His skin crawls desperately at the thought of another’s hands and mouth on him now. He’s been living in a sort of bubble or fever dream, putting off the inevitable reality of his life and who he is and whom he really belongs to; he’s been bought with the deeds to the Moulin Rouge and it is a transaction that cannot be cancelled. Hakyeon imagines going to the Duke and pleading for his freedom because he’s in _love_ ; the utter hopelessness of that path drowns him and forces a sob from his throat.

Harold’s voice begins to echo in his head as Hakyeon begins to walk down the corridor blindly. _It’s over it’s over it’s over_ mingles and overlays the beating of his heart until the rhythm has him dizzy and his breaths aren’t coming fast or easy enough, and when the darkness crowds in the last thing Hakyeon’s consciousness holds on to is the sound of Taekwoon’s laugh.

*

Jealousy is ugly.

Taekwoon can see the pity in the eyes of the musicians, in the actors’ faces when they look at him. Some of the dancers are downright unkind, and don’t bother to hide their sniggering.

He burns quietly by himself, dying silently as the entire cast and crew wait for Hakyeon to come back from the Gothic Tower where he’s gone to appease the Duke and save all their jobs. They can’t possibly change the play’s ending tonight in time for tomorrow – it’s impossible, and they all know it. And so Hakyeon is trying to salvage things the only way he can, the only way that has any chance of working – Taekwoon doesn’t want to think about it. He refuses to think about it. He wants to rip and break and tear and shatter anything and anybody that touches Hakyeon – he would hack down the very Moulin Rouge with his bare hands if he could.

“Never fall in love with a person who sells themselves,” the Argentinean tells him, disdainfully, and Taekwoon gets up to leave.

“It always ends bad!”

Taekwoon grits his teeth and keeps walking. He doesn’t think. He refuses to think. The rage and hurt building up inside him will continue to simmer and not boil over if he just locks down his brain and continues walking and breathing – Hakyeon loves him. Hakyeon _loves_ him. Hakyeon loves _him_. Mere sex means nothing, nothing at all. Hakyeon isn’t going to look at the Duke the way Hakyeon looks at him when they kiss, and Hakyeon isn’t going to shiver the same way when the Duke runs a hand down his bare back, and he isn’t going to enjoy it, he will have to pretend, when the Duke –

_You’re free to leave me but just don’t deceive me_

Hakyeon was supposed to go to the Gothic Tower before, but he turned the Duke down to be with Taekwoon. And then Hakyeon hadn’t showed up.

“When there is no trust there can be no love!” The Argentinean screams at Taekwoon’s retreating back, and Taekwoon crushes the heels of his palms into his eyes. _No. His eyes upon Hakyeon’s face, his hand upon Hakyeon’s hand, his lips caressing Hakyeon’s skin –_ Taekwoon’s hands curl into fists. He keeps walking and savagely swallows down the fire.

When Hakyeon bursts into his rooms barely an hour later half-dressed and distressed with Chocolat hovering protectively nearby Taekwoon cannot process it for a moment, the ugly emotions still gripping him tight. He stares, and it’s only when Hakyeon is in his arms sobbing that his heart begins to thaw. “I couldn’t,” Hakyeon gasps, and Taekwoon can feel ice breaking away from his skin, crackling and melting away as he softens once more. “I couldn’t go through with it. I couldn’t – I didn’t want to lie, I didn’t want to – and the Duke, he knows, he-”

Taekwoon takes Hakyeon’s face in his hands. “Then we’ll leave. We’ll leave tonight. We’ll leave everything behind, Hakyeon.” As he says the words he realises he’s been rehearsing them all night.

“Leave?” Hakyeon repeats, voice small and stunned. “Leave? But the show?”

“I don’t care about the show!” Taekwoon raises his voice, regretting it at Hakyeon’s flinch. “I only care about you. I care about us. We’ll leave and go somewhere where no one knows us. We’ll start again, you and I. We’ll be together and we’ll be safe.”

Hakyeon and Taekwoon stare at each other, and Taekwoon watches the progress of a single tear down Hakyeon’s cheek. He doesn’t want to know what happened in the Gothic Tower. He never wants to know, unless there ever comes a time for him to need to take a man’s life.

“We’ll leave,” Hakyeon repeats once more, nodding slowly and sounding more sure now. “Yes, we’ll go away together.”

“Leave all of this behind, Hakyeon. We don’t need it.”

Hakyeon kisses him fiercely and Taekwoon pours possession and belonging and prayer and worship into every press of his mouth against Hakyeon’s until the urgency of time makes him tear himself away.

He settles himself in to wait for Hakyeon to return after throwing himself about his room packing up his few belongings – shirts, shoes, typewriter – and balls up his nerves, his excitement, getting ready to run around the whole world with Hakyeon with nothing more than what they can carry and the love in their hearts for each other. They’ll live in Rome, and London, and Budapest, and wherever his Hakyeon wants to go – anything Hakyeon wants to see, they’ll travel there, and he’ll write to keep them clothed and fed. He sits down on his bed, forcing himself to keep still under the weight of his dreams.

He waits all night, until the sun comes up. He feels like he has turned to stone in the morning light, like a gargoyle only fit for the dark and all its sins.

Hakyeon coughs quietly, standing in the doorway. He’s changed and looks perfectly put-together, but he hasn’t brought a travelling bag with him. Taekwoon turns slowly and looks, but doesn’t understand what he’s seeing.

“Taekwoon, I’m sorry,” Hakyeon begins, voice smooth and face serene, carefully sympathetic. “I’m not leaving with you.”

“What are you saying?” Taekwoon finally manages to croak, throat dry and brain heart lungs malfunctioning.

“After I left you the Duke came to see me and offered me everything I’ve ever wanted,” Hakyeon explains, perfectly apologetic. “He’s going to make me a famous actor. It’s all I’ve ever dreamed of, Taekwoon.”

_“Cherub, I don’t understand,” Harold sidles out of a shadow, and Hakyeon’s hands freeze and stutter badly over the bag they’re packing. “The Duke wants to make you a star. He’s willing to give you anything you want. And you’re going to throw it all away on a boy?”_

“I don’t understand,” Taekwoon can only say, feeling as stupid and impotent as the ice in his veins. “Earlier, you said – you said we were going to leave here together.”

 _“Yes, Harold, I am. Taekwoon and I are leaving. We’re going away from you and we’re going away from the Moulin Rouge! All my life you’ve made me believe I’m only worth what someone is willing to pay for me,” Hakyeon’s voice breaks sharply on a sob, both angry and pleading. “But Taekwoon loves me, Harold. He_ loves _me, and that is worth everything.”_

“He has one condition, Taekwoon. I must never see you again.”

Taekwoon springs to his feet and grabs Hakyeon’s hands, staring imploringly into his face. “What’s going on, Hakyeon? This is – this can’t be true. What’s happening? Tell me the truth.”

_“The Duke is insanely jealous, cherub. He’s planning to have Taekwoon killed.”_

_Hakyeon’s head raises determinedly to stare at Harold, belied by his fingers trembling over the bag he’s about to pick up. “We don’t care. You can’t scare us anymore, Harold. We’re leaving, and you can’t stop us.”_

_“You’re dying, Hakyeon.”_

Hakyeon tries to pull his hands out of Taekwoon’s grasp but Taekwoon holds on all the more tightly, Hakyeon frowning and tugging more strongly in response.

“Let go,” Hakyeon snaps out of desperation, and the whip in his voice is what causes Taekwoon to step back, eyes large in disbelief. He’s never heard that tone from Hakyeon ever before.

“I’m staying with the Duke, Taekwoon. You knew who I was when you started this whole thing. The truth is I haven’t changed my mind – I still prefer the maharajah over the penniless sitar player, and this courtesan still refuses to starve in the gutter.”

Taekwoon’s eyes rake over Hakyeon’s face, trying hopelessly to find a chink in the armour; any kind of indication that the words he’s hearing aren’t real; maybe this is a dream, and he just has yet to wake up. When he does he’ll find Hakyeon waiting with a full packed bag in his hands and thrill in his eyes, and they’ll be far gone from the Moulin Rouge before daybreak. He just needs to wake up from this nightmare first.

“No,” he says uselessly. Hakyeon purses his mouth in irritation.

“You’re better off going home, Taekwoon,” Hakyeon tells him, and the gentle pity in his voice is scalding. “Please stay away from me and the Moulin Rouge. Goodbye.”

Hakyeon walks quickly down the stairs, half-expecting to hear Taekwoon’s footsteps on the stairs after him, but when he makes it down to the bottom stairwell without being followed he crumples devastatingly in on himself, one hand on the peeling plaster wall holding himself up. The violent sobs wrack his body but are short-lived, Hakyeon wrenching himself back under control almost as fast as he lost it. _I was a fool to believe this could work,_ he rips into himself, trying to breathe over the unbelievable pain. _The show must go on. I have to find the will to carry on with the show._

Harold looks at Hakyeon when he walks back into the Moulin Rouge, back straight and perfect; a quick flick of his eyes over Hakyeon’s body as if assessing damage.

“Is it done?”

“Why live life from dream to dream?” Hakyeon answers back tonelessly, and ascends the stairs to his dressing room. “It all ends today.”

The play opens tonight.

**

“He’s yours now,” Taekwoon tells the Duke, speaking out towards the spellbound audience as the cast stares – at the stark bitterness in his voice, at Hakyeon at his feet. “I’ve paid my whore.” The money flutters down around Hakyeon’s body, each paper bill a damning insult, and Taekwoon hates himself for the gasps he hears and the look in Hakyeon’s eyes as he looks up at Taekwoon.

“Thank you for curing me of my ridiculous obsession with love,” he whispers brokenly. Hakyeon has never been more beautiful than he is tonight – white outfit showing off his gorgeous skin, pearls and gold in his hair and dark-lined eyes, but the colour is running now from tears Hakyeon is loathe to shed, blinking them back furiously and trying to hold his head up defiantly. Taekwoon’s seen enough; he can’t take much more of being this near to Hakyeon and yet so far apart in every single way. It is all broken, all irrevocably destroyed.

He takes off the stolen jacket and lets it fall to the stage – a perfect match, they looked, in their stage wedding costumes – and begins to walk off towards the theatre doors as the audience murmurs fitfully and stirs. The Duke doesn’t even deign to look at him; the victor awaiting his lofty prize and the defeated leaving with nothing but wounds.

“The greatest thing you’ll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return!”

Toulouse’s voice yells out stridently, jarringly, stopping Taekwoon in his tracks for a moment because of the crush to the heart the words deliver. It seems like a lifetime ago that he wrote that line, believing in every single word and the proof of the truth of them lying opposite him in bed every night. It is not better to have loved and lost, Taekwoon thinks. It is not better at all.

He forces himself to start moving once more, only to falter terribly again once he hears Hakyeon begin to sing.

He turns around very, very slowly – this cannot be a joke, Hakyeon would not, could not be this cruel to him, not after everything that’s happened – and Hakyeon is staring straight at him.

“Never knew I could feel like this, like I’ve never seen the sky before,” Hakyeon begins tremulously before taking a breath. “Want to vanish inside your kiss; every day I’m loving you more and more.”

Hakyeon’s voice breaks on the last word and the breath he takes hitches painfully in his chest, but he recovers quickly. Taekwoon is rooted to the spot, Hakyeon’s warm voice washing over him as if in a dream.

“Seasons may change, winter to spring. But I love you.” There is nothing and no one Taekwoon can see but Hakyeon – no Duke, no Harold, no audience, no cast and no crew. “Until the end of time.”

The look on Hakyeon’s face as he stares at Taekwoon is devastatingly hopeful but tormented nonetheless – what chance can there be for the two of them now, with the Duke sitting right there? – almost like this is Hakyeon’s final farewell to him. Taekwoon doesn’t understand – Hakyeon pushed him away so firmly Taekwoon had been convinced Hakyeon hadn’t felt the same – but this; this is not just any song. Hakyeon loves him again. _Hakyeon loves him,_ and that is everything that matters in the entire world no matter how short this interlude may last.

Taekwoon begins to walk back to the stage, singing in reply to Hakyeon who blooms like a desert flower after rain – the most beautiful smile Taekwoon has ever seen, on the most beautiful face. The audience is up in arms and the cast members have no idea what to do, but all Taekwoon wants is to get back on that stage and hold Hakyeon once again. He almost runs, pulled back by an invisible thread of attraction binding the two of them together until he has Hakyeon in his arms and the cast erupts in song around them as if heaven itself is lending them its choirs to celebrate their reunion.

“I love you,” Hakyeon is repeating, over and over into Taekwoon’s mouth as they hold each other close. Every word is a prayer and a promise. “He would have had you killed, I had no choice-”

Freedom is the privilege of being completely known and loved anyway at your most ugly and tired and worthless; freedom is how Taekwoon wants Hakyeon to see every single part of him and knows that Hakyeon won’t shy away or leave because of it.

Beauty is everything about Hakyeon, all the time – how he moves and speaks and laughs and dances and gets excited and sings and jokes. Taekwoon can’t look away. Beauty is the joy Hakyeon brings to Taekwoon’s life – colours are richer, sounds are sweeter, tastes are fuller.

Truth is being honest with yourself – truth is not bowing down to fear’s version of reality. Truth is the depth of emotion which cannot be hidden behind lies and deception, and the search for truth is what keeps us surviving. Hakyeon is Taekwoon’s truth, just as Taekwoon is Hakyeon’s.

And love; love is:

They sing, and they sing, and Taekwoon knows this is something he would never have been able to forget – he would have been in love with Hakyeon for all time, with his heart and mind and body, with the fingers that ran through Hakyeon’s hair and the mouth that kissed his lips. _So this is true love_ , Taekwoon thinks, _this feeling of completeness._

_If I should die this very moment I wouldn’t fear, for I’ve never known completeness like being here wrapped in the warmth of you loving every breath of you_

“I love you too,” Taekwoon replies, and he can feel Hakyeon smiling wide with simple, pure happiness against his cheek.

*


End file.
